


On the Helmsman‘s Watch

by starkeeper



Series: Reda Shepard [7]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Gen, Mass Effect 1, The Thorian, and the Thorian's aftermath, beacon angst, feros
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-11
Updated: 2020-07-11
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:20:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,810
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25207588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starkeeper/pseuds/starkeeper
Summary: Joker's job includes a lot more than just flying the Normandy.~ ~ ~ ~ ~Joker could tell the individual walking patterns and steps for literally everyone on this ship apart. Came with too much time alone in the cockpit and always sitting with his back to everybody else. It wasn‘t even something he specifically trained to do. It had always come natural for him. Side effects of sitting around most of his life, thanks to breaking his bones with almost anything normal people would do.Not that it would make any difference in the end who was approaching him, but it was nice to know. Gave him some fake sense of power about the situation. And he had expected Shepard. She was like some old mechanical clockwork, always functioning, immune to fluctuations in power - she just worked. Even though he would have preferred her to sleep rather than doing her usual check in with him before they headed to a new mission.Without looking up from the consoles in front of him, without turning his chair around, he greeted her with „You look like shit, Commander.“
Relationships: Jeff "Joker" Moreau & Female Shepard, Jeff "Joker" Moreau & Shepard, Jeff 'Joker' Moreau & Shepard
Series: Reda Shepard [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/253930
Comments: 8
Kudos: 8





	On the Helmsman‘s Watch

** On the Helmsman‘s Watch **

Joker listened over the comm when they held their debriefings. Always.

There were several reasons for keeping his ears out for literally everything that happened on the Normandy, but usually it was just the commander‘s frequency running in the background for him. Not that he would mind hearing all the gossip that used to take place on a ship like this - though, to be fair, the amount of gossip on the Normandy was almost non-existent compared to every other vessel he had served on. This ship was different on various levels. The amount of professionalism everyone on board had seemed to equal the financial value it held. So even if he would try to look out for gossip - not that he would ever do that of course - he wouldn‘t find much. Besides, his main task (besides flying the ship, of course) was keeping an ear on the commander‘s channel, not on technical discussions or private chatter. And, quite frankly, he had never been a fan of tattling anyways. When you‘re the target of gossip all life long, it didn‘t make you develop a huge interest in actively taking part of that machine yourself later. 

The main reason for him to listen wasn’t to spy on people, least on the commander herself. It was a simple part of the multitasking everyone on this ship was practicing. The Normandy was a prototype deep scout frigate which ran on a skeleton crew. That wasn’t due to cut fundings - if anything, this project didn’t lack funding - but it was part of the turian/human experiment they were undertaking. A smaller, but more efficient crew, allowing them more flexibility and less risks of - yeah, what exactly? Espionage? Joker never really got that part, but he didn’t mind having a smaller, more independent crew. His reasons for being what Shepard jokingly called her shadow were practical, not sensationalist. Besides being involved in mission and course planning, he was also preparing the reports during missions. Technically that would have fallen into Pressly’s scope of responsibilities. But once captain Anderson had passed the baton on to Shepard (willingly or not wasn’t a matter of concern here), Shepard had asked Joker to do that part and Pressly to focus on keeping up with the diplomatic down sides of their mission. So far, it proved to be a well functioning division of labour. And it gave Joker some minor feeling of not being completely useless once the ground team was trying to get themselves killed in action outside again - and if it was just because he kept himself busy with keeping a close look an Shepard’s helm cam and audio channel. Not that he could intervene or something. 

Sometimes though, he just listened to the debriefings to cut off the comm link to the council should the Commander ever require it. Accidentally, of course. Problems with the comm buoys. Driving through a space tunnel. Rustling candy wrappers that interfered with the reception. Something like that. Not that it had ever happened before, but if being asked, he damn well got why it had to happen this day of all days. That the turian councilor had had the balls to throw some racist remark her way even though they had read the report on Feros before… All the council did was second-guessing Shepard, criticising each and every decision she made even though word was spectres didn’t answer to the council - bullshit! Obviously they did, judging the number of times Shepard had to report in. It a miracle to him how Shepard could keep such a diplomatic stand towards them up to that point. Joker on the other hand… Well, he didn’t regret the decisions that were made in today’s debriefing. Cutting the council felt right. And he would do it again. 

Following their channels during missions could range from straight up boring all the way to worse than ripping your own nails out. Feros had been one of the latter, and he had only sat here listening to it. He wasn’t the one with strange apocalyptic visions in his head. He wasn’t the one facing once again people who had fucking lost their minds for just another reason or running into whatever thing the thorian was. 

When the ground team arrived back on the Normandy thirty six hours later, it wasn’t just them who were noticeably tense.   
Kaidan had been checking in on them regularly, or rather: he had spent way too much time in the cockpit not so casually insisting on updates on what was going on on Feros. Hell, it wasn’t part of Joker’s job to play telephone with him when the commander way away. And while he was used to be condemned to inactivity in here, same didn’t apply to Kaidan. Which made him annoying as fuck in the end. At times, Joker felt like he was babysitting him, and he lacked the patience to pamper Kaidan while he listened to the ground team taking shots by geth or zombies or brainwashed asari at the same time. At some point Joker had simply shared the helm cam footage for a while with Kaidan, but that didn’t make him any less annoying. Quite the contrary. So eventually Joker had thrown him out of the cockpit again, more or less successful.   
Liara checked in twice, trying to cover it up by entrapping Joker in some random conversations about the prothean ruins on Feros. It was obvious that the asari regretted not being part of the ground team, but Joker got why Shepard had chosen her squad. This wasn’t some kind of fun archaeological expedition to study some ancient races and cultures. This was fucking important. And Shepard went with whom she worked with best - if that wasn’t Kaidan or Liara, he wouldn’t argue with her decision. So Joker had thrown out Liara, too, even if he had tried to do it in a much politer way. After all what he was doing required his full attention, even if it looked like he wasn’t doing anything at all when the ship wasn’t moving. And he couldn’t care less about prothean ruins and culture and Liara’s moroseness about all the years of her research being wasted by Shepard’s discovery. 

So by the time Shepard, Garrus and Tali came back, everyone was tense to some extent. The restlessness some of the highest ranking officers showed had carried on to the rest of the crew. Having Kaidan pace up and down the CIC for no reason every two hours while the commander was away sent a message to the crew that Joker doubted was productive and helpful, but God, he got it. If he wasn’t bound to this chair like he was, he could have needed some pacing as well. And all of them had just been waiting here. Thirty six hours of waiting for the crew usually meant time for maintenance work, preparations and some down time for those not on their shift. Thirty six hours on Feros though - that was a completely different story. 

A mission like that should take several days or just a couple of hours - what Shepard, Garrus and Tali had gone through fell in the exact gap between both that was just plainly unhealthy. And that didn‘t even need brain-washed plant-zombified creepers or constant geth attacks - they had just been the icing on the cake. None of them had gotten more than half an hour of a break at a time within those thirty six hours - hell, he hadn‘t, but he had taken couple of those tiny breaks to feel fit for duty in between. But for the ground team that was a time span that just wasn’t healthy nor efficient. And _on top of that_ there had been geth and brain-washed plant-zombified creepers. 

Joker listened to the heavy silence that had a lock on the whole ship‘s crew once the team arrived back on board. It was like fog, and not like the good one. Hell, he grew up in space - fog was never something good for him anyways. And this really felt like some very threatful fog occupying the Normandy. Feros left them all a bit off, it seemed.   
The silence was only disrupted by Shepard‘s heavy breathing that nobody besides him noticed while they made their way down to the cargo bay to get rid of their armor and whatever else they felt the need to get rid of - but that made it all too clear to his quiet helmsman‘s outpost right in front of the ship, where he was limited to sit and listen to missions via comm channel and video transmission and not able to do much more than that.

He sat and listened to the debriefing that followed a mere twenty minutes later with no time to rest for the ground team, but tons of questions by the rest of the crew in charge.  
He listened to Shepard snapping at Liara in front of everyone else for asking her if she was doing okay. Snapping at her for offering help with whatever had happened down on Zhu‘s Hope that neither he nor Liara nor any of the rest of them could even rudimentarily grasp.  
He listened to Shepard snapping at the council moments later until he cut off the connection almost before she ordered him to do so.  
He listened to her snapping at some crew member for simply crossing her path on the way to her cabin wrong spot wrong time.

When he heard the characteristic sound of her cabin‘s door closing behind her and the yelling started, he turned off the audio transmission.

* * *

He had not tracked the forty seven minutes that had passed since he silenced the channel and made sure Shepard had some badly needed privacy. Of course not. Yet, it took him not at all by surprise when not even an hour after they had arrived back on the Normandy one of Admiral Hackett‘s transmissions came in. As if that bastard knew exactly when one mission was done and when they were (not! today they were really not!) up to solve someone else’s bullshit.

Hesitantly he reopened the comm channel to Shepard, condemning Hackett, himself and the universe. 

„Erm, Commander, I hate to disturb you, but you got an incoming call from Admiral Hackett. Seems to be important.“

He thought he would sound bitter, but all his voice showed was empathy and pity. He hated himself for it, knowing just how much Shepard would disapprove being pitied by him or anybody else. 

He heard a hoarse _It always is_ , not even addressed to and deliberately ignored by him, followed by a deep inhale. Finally, a somewhat awake, somewhat fit, somewhat braced and still mostly exhausted „Patch him through to my private terminal“ reached him.

Forty seven minutes, Joker thought bitterly, while he listened to Hackett‘s message and Shepard‘s „Yes, Sir“ and „Of course, Sir“ and „We‘ll get the job done, Sir“ that showed none of Shepard’s exhaustion. She was good at that. That’s why they had picked her. They had allowed her forty seven minutes to deal with whatever happened on Feros, until they decided that that was enough rest for a soldier like Shepard.

* * *

Joker could tell the individual walking patterns and steps for literally everyone on this ship apart. Came with too much time alone in the cockpit and always sitting with his back to everybody else. It wasn‘t even something he specifically trained to do. It had always come natural for him. Side effects of sitting around most of his life, thanks to breaking his bones with almost anything normal people would do.

Not that it would make any difference in the end who was approaching him, but it was nice to know. Gave him some fake sense of power about the situation. And he had expected Shepard. She was like some old mechanical clockwork, always functioning, immune to fluctuations in power - she just worked. Even though he would have preferred her to sleep rather than doing her usual check in with him before they headed to a new mission.

Without looking up from the consoles in front of him, without turning his chair around, he greeted her with „You look like shit, Commander.“

Joker was probably the only person on this ship who could speak up to Shepard this outright and not even fear a grim glance in return, not to speak of any other consequences. They had known each other since Shepard failed flight class on Arcturus Station eight years ago, long before they teamed up on the Normandy. He knew he was one of the very few persons she would consider being a real friend - she just wasn‘t good at making any. Or at least that’s what she had told him once over a few too many drinks they’d shared on shore leave. He wasn’t sure he would second that, but damn, he got it. He sure wasn’t a good example of how to win friends either, so it was kind of a win win situation for both of them. The strange kids teaming up over not fitting in but excelling everyone else. Well, except in flight class. But if Shepard hadn’t failed that and Joker hadn’t be penalised to teach the losers at that time, chances were high they’d never met. So, working together on the Normandy didn’t do them any harm - especially on days like today. 

Usually, he would still get at least some kind of sarcastic response in return for such a comment. But today she didn‘t even look at him, snorted halfheartedly (if anything, it sounded like an exhausted, failed exhalation, not like one of her otherwise characteristic snorts) and stared at the monitor in front of her.

„Thanks. Sounds about right.“

There wasn‘t even a _you didn‘t even look, Jeff_. He had expected that at least. Hoped for it. Maybe even hoped to make her laugh a little.  
He didn‘t need to get a visual to know she was doing shitty. He could tell by the noise she made when she heavily collapsed into the empty co-pilot‘s chair instead of silently slipping into it as usual. Once she had slipped into it so cat-like that he _almost_ hadn‘t noticed her - almost, because in the cockpit he noticed everything. Nothing could slip under his observation. But once, she had almost managed to beat the record.  
Today though? Reminded him more of a rock wrapped in wet paper that fell to the ground. Klonk. Nothing cat-like about her right now.  
And getting just plain approval from her instead of any of the usual range of reactions was something almost worth worrying.

Joker tried to crack some joke, but only managed to push out some sarcastic, bitter comment instead.

„What, a whole people‘s memory is too much for one Commander Shepard‘s brain? Lo and behold.“

Shepard muttered something like a tired laugh, acknowledging his attempt at least, appreciating it, but again it didn‘t become more than a very exhausted breath.

After that, silence filled the small room, only disturbed by a low constant hum. The Normandy was quieter than any Alliance ship either of them had served on. While one would think of that as an advantage, it was something neither Joker nor Shepard had been able to fully embrace yet. Especially for Joker, who grew up on ships and space stations all of his life, the Normandy sometimes just didn‘t feel like a real ship. He had never been on any turian cruisers, but if they were anything like this - or even worse - he would feel like he was on some kind of bad vacation. A vacation from being in space, just without being somewhere else. The thought of it was already unsettling. But that was him being extra picky about something no one should complain about. Besides that, he was _very_ fond of the Normandy. He was still as in love with her as when he first heard about her existence - heard, not even seen. He had loved the mere thought of this ship existing, and now it was his. More or less. 

Today though, the silence of the Normandy seemed like a bad joke. It was so bloody _efficient_. And it seemed as if everyone expected the crew to be just as efficient - better than everything that had been there before - and forgot that the crew was still just human. Well, most of them at least. Hand-picked, top of the line, yeah - but still human. And that applied to the commander as well, even if people liked to ignore that. 

„Know what?“, Joker resumed their one-sided conversation. „Feels like even our people have lost sight of the actual goal. On top of the council. All the shit everyone suddenly needs handled? Oh yeah, _we know_ you‘re hunting down a rogue spectre we ignored as long as possible. You gotta fix that for us. But here we have a super random problem no one else can solve but you, but really, _no pressure_. Because it‘s random. And important. But really. Do what you think is _right_.“ He almost spit out the word. „Like, is anybody able to solve their own shit these days? No? That‘s some disappointing regress the galaxy is making there.“

He didn‘t call out anyone in specific, because that was the kind of insubordination even he would think about twice before committing it loudly. Not that he wouldn‘t commit it anyways. And it wasn‘t just Rear Admiral Hackett who drew his resentment in this very moment for that shitty mission they were heading towards. It was like every single being of the damn galaxy suddenly discovered their brother, mother, great-grand-uncle, pet-varren, or long sworn enemy needed immediate attention. Sometimes the pet-varren even was the long sworn enemy! Oh, yeah, there was a long lost and almost forgotten nuke probe that had to be discreetly disabled to not have the First Contact War renewed. Of course there was. And some crazy scientists. And crazy colonists. And crazy VIs. And crazy asari matriarchs. And crazy fucking plant-or-whatever-abomination-like _things_. Seemed like everyone had gone insane to at least twenty percent these days, and Shepard had to solve it. Because, _of course_. As if it wasn’t enough that they were trying to catch a crazy turian spectre. 

_Just_ a rogue turian spectre. While humanity was still seen as a threat mostly. Not in the same way like the batarians or the vorcha - humanity was rather the angry new kid on the block who refused to cooperate after being punched in the face as a welcome, not the fearsome bully. But they wouldn’t win a popularity award either. And now humanity - or at least the first human spectre, who definitely stood for humanity as a whole - was trying to bring down one of the council’s top agents.   
_Just_ Saren.  
As if it was just Saren.  
And so far they didn‘t even know what he was after or about to do. All they had were loose ends and hints that led nowhere and a shitload of people that fought for their attention with their shitty problems and that stuff in Shepard’s head that she couldn‘t make any sense of.

„You should learn to say no, Commander.“ Joker had a knack for reading her thoughts and gave a shit on timing. Now was as good or bad as ever. „Just saying.“

Shepard threw him a tired look. „There‘s lives at stake.“ 

Joker shrugged. „Yeah. So what. There always are. Do you want to save every single being in this galaxy? Good luck with that, Commander.“

„Doesn‘t mean I cannot try.“

„Or die trying.“

„It‘s our job, Jeff.“

„Well, most people would define ‚our job‘ slightly different, you know? In a more healthy way. Without all the setting yourself on fire to keep the galaxy warm. Because just in case you didn’t notice: that’s still setting yourself on fire, right? You’re not the only one who can take care of shit.“

Shepard crossed her arms, leaned her head back and closed her eyes. „If no one feels the responsibility to try and help, no one will be helped. Let the other person do it. They again think the same. Next one, too. Do you really want to be part of that process?“ 

Joker groaned. How was he surrounded by people who sticked to their principles on all costs like that? „Oh come on, stop that! If you put it that way, everyone who disagrees is an asshole. I was trying to be on your side here, okay?“

Shepard snorted. „I know. But how we feel and how we act can be very different - and should be when it comes to this. It‘s not like I don‘t agree with you, but I refuse to-“ She stopped half way and yawned.

„You spent too much time with the Captain, you know that, right?“

Joker listened to her silence for some time, until he looked at her with worry again. He was already tired and he hadn’t set a foot out of this cockpit the whole time. How did Shepard have to feel? And still she had come for their usual pre-mission briefing? He would be damned if he was unable to crack some kind of bad joke tonight that wouldn’t make her grin a little or something. Something to make up for all that shit at least for a moment. And if it was just speaking out loud what she felt like she couldn’t say because she was the commander and the spectre and all that shit. But he was just the crippled, sarcastic pilot, people expected him to complain. 

„By the way, that thing was _ugly_ , you know? The Thorian, not the asari. Was that even a plant? Looked more like a leech to me. An oversized, ugly, bloodsucking abominable leech, with all it‘s tentacles and drooling and“ he gestured with his hands, mimicking claws digging their ways into whatever had happened down there, making a face that showed clearly what he thought of that creature and exaggerating it just a little more to help his plan. Had to make her laugh. At least a little. „Like in these 20th-century horror sci-fi movies. They don‘t make these any more, but back then people knew how to freak you out. Imagine that, fifty thousand years of-“ He kept making grabby hands and sucking noises. „Disgusting!“

„No kidding“ Shepard replied tiredly.

Joker damned himself. Not even that could make her laugh? „Yeah no kidding, Commander. It was really like-“

„I was there, Jeff. And I wasn‘t very fond of it either.“

He looked at her and sighed. „Yeah. I guess you weren‘t.“ After a while he added: „And _The Old Growth_? Man, that thing had some serious ego issues.“ When even that wouldn‘t get any different reaction from her, he gave up for tonight.

„You know, you _really_ look like shit, Reda. Have you seen the Doc yet?“

The time that passed until she answered with a soupcon of tired sarcasm (that was more tired than sarcastic) had Joker almost think she finally fell asleep. But again, it stopped at almost. Like a clockwork. Never falling out of line. 

„Why, so that mum can add another comment to my file?“ She shrugged, hardly lifting her shoulders off the little comfortable chair. „Of course I have. You know that she double checks on me since Eden Prime. There‘s not much she can do about it. It‘s not like I run on some ancient blueprints for how to-“, she paused. „I don‘t even know what. I just know we have to stop it.“

Joker turned his head again in her direction, trying to see any difference in her compared to before they went to Eden Prime. He didn‘t see any, just that those dark circles around her eyes grew bigger every day that passed. He knew he should probably keep his mouth shut, but the words came out before he could self-regulate.

„What exactly _did_ you see down there? You know, helm cam doesn‘t capture all the... vision-y stuff and shit. Only what‘s going on in the real world.“

He had seen the asari say something about ancestral memories and that Shepard now would understand prothean culture, but he hadn‘t actually seen what happened when she did her magic little trick. Straight after popping out of that breeding capsule bound to the Thorian that looked like some kind of disgusting ancient spider egg or something - damn it, who would enjoy being mind-fucked by whatever came out of something like that? Turned out Shepard wasn’t very fond of that kind of magic, as he had learned over the last debriefing, when Liara offered the same shady trick to help Shepard. _Help_. Looking at Shepard he doubted that it was very helpful. But then again who did enjoy being mind-fucked - except maybe the asari themselves?   
But down on Feros, when that stuff had happened, the whole time - and it was a couple of minutes at least that felt extra long being bound to this damn chair all the time unable to take any tangible action - the whole time the cam had just shown that asari in front of Shepard, black eyed, staring at her in a quite frantic way, mumbling something about embracing eternity (whatever that was supposed to mean). And among all the staring there had been tiny outbursts of shaking in between that let him play guessing games with what was going on with the commander in the meantime. That shaking didn‘t seem normal, but whatever the asari did wasn’t either. And Shepard seemed... unsettled. Now even more than before.

For a moment, Joker wasn‘t sure if Shepard even considered answering his question. She did eventually, but even then he felt just as lost as before.

„I don‘t know... I don't - I don't even know how to describe the pictures - visions - memories, whatever it is.“

„Did it help at all?“

„It made... some of it clearer. But it‘s still not making any sense to me.“

So much for the stupid asari mind tricks. 

„Did it make it harder?“

„No.“

His first impulse was to argue with her about that obviously lied answer, but he kept to himself, bit his tongue, reminding himself that it wasn’t his job to get her involved in some stupid discussion on principles on a day like this. Was she setting herself on fire? Fuck, yes. Would she stop it just because he insisted? By now he knew her better than that. Shepard wasn’t here because she put her own needs before others. Which meant someone else needed to take that role, reminding her to sleep or eat or say fuck it, even if that sounded stupid. Shepard was a grown ass woman and still she was here and not somewhere else, sleeping or recharging her batteries. 

Before he could try to word a somewhat diplomatic response, she corrected herself, as if being inside of his brain listening to his silent mutter. 

„No. Yeah. I guess it...“ She tried to take a deep breath but failed at it. „It will probably - I mean… Ask me again after I slept, right?“

„Right...“ Joker murmured something in response, but didn‘t actually reply. She hadn’t come here so that he could try to fix her problems or give her some clever advice. There were several people on this ship better suited for that - she didn’t need him to lecture her. 

By now, Joker also felt exhaustion creeping into his bones. Not in the same amount as the commander, of course, but sitting here one and a half days watching her, always being on the go - not that he‘d complain. But even thinking about what happened with Shepard in all of this gave him a headache. „Not so much of a great gift like she said, is it?“ Liara had called it that, a gift, but Joker doubted that it hit close to reality for Shepard. 

„There‘s millions of voices screaming in my head. Burning. Dying. Voices of people I don‘t even know, because they vanished fifty thousand years ago. How can that be considered a gift?“

Fuck. If she put it that way… That sounded way worse than what they had talked about earlier. There was probably a difference between seeing some flashy funky images inside your head and… witnessing a genocide? Because that’s what it just sounded like. And not like a movie you could easily turn off again. 

„Yah... Guess not. What shitshow was that beacon on Eden Prime even?“

Shepard sighed. „Hell if I know... That‘s what this is all about, right? Making sense. Doesn‘t make much yet.“

They faded back into that exhausted mode of silence that filled the cockpit for the time being. The concern Shepard muttered some minutes later, quietly, hesitantly, hit Joker completely unexpected. And she was aware of that. 

„What if in some weeks from now I’m the same like them?“

„Same as who?“

„Those people on Zhu’s Hope.“ She made a tired gesture with her hand next to her head. 

„Hm?“ Did she mean...

„We have no idea what the beacon does with...“

„You.“

„People“ she corrected him, but he had hit home. The moment he realized that sent shivers down his back. 

„What if eventually the…“ Shepard hesitated. „What if the visions take over?“

Joker looked at her. „That what you think?“

„You don’t?“

„I think you’re too stubborn for that. It will take at least another month until you lose it.“

Instead of laughing, Shepard became only more silent and serious, and Joker condemned himself for that really bad joke he'd made. 

„What _if_ it takes another month until I snap, Jeff? I see the big picture here and why we do all of this, I do. But the moment I close my eyes, when I’m not occupied with anything“ - basically the very moment she was trying to catch some deeply needed sleep, he got that loud and clear - „the… that… shit gets loud. And I’m… I… It’s...“

„You’re not losing your mind, Reda.“

„How do you know?“ She sounded scared, and he had to try hard to not have that scare him, too. 

„You’re tired. That’s normal after being among geth and zombies for thirty six hours, don’t you think?“

It didn’t answer Shepard’s concern, but Joker wasn’t sure he was able to answer that. Not in a way that would help. Was he convinced that she wasn’t slowly going crazy? Hell, with what she said how it felt, he was sure _he_ would lose it sooner or later. But he wasn’t her and she had always been better than him. No need to doubt that now. And she needed him to believe in her, unconditionally, so he did. 

„Seriously Shep, you’re just wasted. Remember how Liara was so friggin’ impressed about how the cipher didn’t directly break your fragile human mind? She’s right. You’re strong. Doesn’t mean you can’t be strong _and_ tired both at the same time. Actually, it would scare me if you weren’t.“

Shepard stared at the flashing numbers and graphs on the console in front of her with dry, tired eyes, not repeating anything to what he said. When she kept being silent, he tried to push her out of here. 

„While we‘re at it, Commander. Where‘s Tali and Garrus?“

Shepard shot him a short irritated look from the side. „Off duty. What did you expect me to do with them after a mission like this?“

„Yeah, exactly my point“, he returned sarcastically. „Isn‘t that where you should be, too? Off duty? Probably curled up in that fancy huge bed of yours catching some sleep?“ Before she could shut him down for the unwelcome reference to inheriting Captain Anderson‘s cabin, he shrugged aggressively. „Just saying. You should catch some sleep - _somewhere_. And these chairs are crap if anything in that almighty body of yours is already hurting. Guess it is, probably.“

„That‘s true, Jeff“ Chakwas suddenly said behind them. 

Both Joker and Shepard winced in surprise when they heard the unexpected Doctor’s voice behind them. So much for nothing going unnoticed in the cockpit for Joker.

„And same goes for you, if you don‘t mind me saying. The Commander is half an hour late for supervised sleep examination and you haven‘t been out of the cockpit since the ground team set out, so take this as an official order to get some sleep, Jeff. Commander.“

„Yah. Well, you know-“ Joker started, but Chakwas cut him off. 

„Get out of that chair and go to sleep, Jeff. Now.“

Before he could finish his usual half-assed _You know I would help you up from there if I wouldn‘t break a bone with that kind of politeness_ -comment directed at Shepard, the commander had already heaved herself up from the co-pilot‘s chair and reached out for him, helping him up in return.

With her hand suddenly very close to his face, waiting for him to grab it, he groaned. „Damn it, when did you-? Ugh, never mind.“ He let her help him up, grimacing when he finally got out of the ever same position. „Thanks.“

Shepard’s hand was still guiding him while they eventually left the cockpit. Even now Shepard was blindly following the Doc’s orders, he thought bitterly, not giving any backtalk, not permitting herself a second to complain because she was tired - hell, she looked so fucking tired. Joker doubted she would have gotten out of that chair so fast if it wasn’t to get him out of here as well. 

* * *

Ten hours later, Shepard was back at being the Normandy’s commanding officer again. There was no sign of exhaustion or self-doubt, not even a scratch in the ever so brightly shining aura of hers, at least not towards the rest of the crew. She was almost a bit cheerful, though Joker didn’t know if that was a sudden change of mind or rather a whole lot of sleep deprivation speaking. But he heard those few shaky breaths she took moments before they left the ship. Prove enough for him that her night hadn’t been as restful as he’d hoped for. Both of them. 

„Ready to dismantle some long lost nuke?“ He heard her saying over their private channel, bracing herself, pushing away the stress of a whole people’s memory inside her head, moments after the Mako touched ground on Agebinium. 

Joker’s voice was calm and steady when he answered. „Born ready, Commander. Let’s make sure the Alliance has no reason to shit themselves, right?“

This time, he could almost hear her smile. 

„Right.“ 

Joker always listened during their missions. It was part of his job, sure. But it also took some stress away from Shepard. And it gave him a feeling of not being completely useless up here once the ground team left the Normandy. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! A little feedback is always most welcome. <3
> 
> Biggest shoutout to Guileandgall and Swaps55 for doing an incredibly amazing work at betaing this and helping it get so much better than the first version was. I'm very excited to explore more of the relationship between Jeff&Reda in the future.


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